Prayers
by Nyah
Summary: There was a sandwich on the table, a plate to return, and a war to fight and Derek was here, over-thinking underwear." Derek does laundry. One-shot. Slightly Derek/Sarah.


**Disclaimer:** I claim no affiliation with Fox or the folks at T:SCC

**Summary: ** "There was a sandwich on the table, a plate to return, and a war to fight and Derek was here, over-thinking underwear." Derek does laundry. One-shot.

**Warnings**: None

**Rating:** PG-13

**Characters:** Derek Reese, Sarah Connor

**Pairing:** Derek/Sarah

**Timeline:** non-specific

**Prayers**

Sarah's neck cracked at the slightest twist as she opened the front door to her house. She'd been lying at an odd angle for half an hour while she helped Kacy sort out the mess she'd made of her baby's crib. It was a little after noon and Kacy had insisted on putting together sandwiches for Sarah and "her guy" after the crib was assembled. "Reese!" Sarah called.

"Yeah?" His voice rang out from the laundry room.

"Food." She put the sandwich down on the kitchen table and noted that she'd have to make another trip to Kacy's to return the plate like a good neighbor would do.

Derek didn't emerge immediately like he usually did at the mention of food. He must not have finished the laundry he'd started before Sarah went to help Kacy. In a lot of ways Derek was a useful pain in the ass. He was helpful, certainly, when it came to recon or a firefight. Sarah couldn't say she resented a guy who was clearly willingly to take a bullet for her son. But while Kyle Reese had been the prophet of doom that changed Sarah Connor's life in 48 hours, Derek Reese was the prophet that cleaned the guns and cut the lawn.

Sarah couldn't remember the last time she'd come home to dishes in the sink or a dirty bathroom. In a lot of ways Derek was a better housewife than Sarah Connor would ever be- but she didn't especially feel the need to share that observation. At first she thought he was straightening the house as an excuse to poke through their stuff and while he'd done that too, the house continued to stay clean even after he'd found most everything she didn't want him to find. Sarah was fairly certain he cleaned out of boredom- like most wars, theirs involved a lot of waiting around.

"Reese," Sarah said, pushing through the half-open laundry room door and noticing, as she sometimes did, that the name didn't sting so much as it did once. "What the hell are you doing?"

Derek had begun doing his own and John's laundry almost as soon as he was well enough to walk around the house. She'd seen him at it a few times. He'd take clothing from the dryer and fold it methodically with the far away look in his eyes that he got over the strangest things- cereal bowls or dripping faucets or his own reflection. He folded like he expected to carry his clothes on his back. John's shirts came back to him in compact stacks with precisely folded creases.

Until now, Derek hadn't ever done Sarah or Cameron's laundry. Sarah figured she couldn't order him out of her room and get her laundry done at the same time. And Sarah could almost feel his skin crawl at the idea of touching Cameron's clothing. But apparently he'd changed his mind because the first thing Sarah saw when she opened the door was underwear. Her underwear.

There were less than a dozen sets of mostly cotton underwear with a few lacey bits thrown into the mix. All of them were bright, solid colors. They were pinned, evenly spaced across the clothesline that was mounted, near eye-level, to the wall. A window was open in the laundry room and the laundry on the line fluttered a little in the light breeze. Light shined through the colorful bits of cotton and gauzy lace, softening like it might through stained- glass. Derek was staring at the line of underwear with his unabashed, mile-long stare that was somewhere between focused and concussed. Sarah found herself remembering prayer flags she'd seen on the side of a mountain in Nepal. Every time the wind moved them it was supposed to take the prayers written upon them to heaven. _Om._

"What the hell are you doing?" Sarah repeated.

"Your laundry," He said. "What does it look like?"

It looks like you're staring at my panties. _Om Mani Padme._ "You don't do my laundry."

"You wore that same shirt yesterday."

"Not for long. It wasn't dirty."

"You didn't have any clean clothes."

Sarah saw that two laundry baskets were filled with neatly folded stacks of her clothing. "Thank you," was on her lips but then she realized his eyes hadn't moved to acknowledge her. "You going to keep that up or do you _want _me to ask you why you're staring at my underwear?"

Derek shrugged. Her many pairs of black cotton Hanes and Fruit of the Loom were folded in the baskets along with the rest of her clothing. Only the bright pairs had been pinned to hang-dry. She ducked under the line and stepped up into his personal space, shoving at his shoulder with the side of her fist because he wasn't even looking at her but she felt like her was seeing her naked- and maybe every other woman in the world too. The dryer was humming rhythmically with the work of another load of laundry.

He touched a pair of powder blues that hung just behind Sarah's left ear. "I've never known a woman who wore colored underwear before," He said casually like he hadn't noticed how confused Sarah was and how quickly her confusion was becoming anger. "It's always black," He said, talking about a different when. "And not usually clean."

Sarah didn't know what to say to that so she said, "You don't need to hang it. It can go in the dryer."

Derek nodded and said, "OK." But she thought he'd already known as much and then thought again, absurdly, of the prayer flags.

"Clothes mostly start out black or get that way quick enough," Derek said because they were standing under her underwear and neither of them was talking. "there aren't really colors or brands or… whatever." He fiddled with the tag on the powder blues. "Buddy of mine taught history before the bombs fell. He always said we should bring back the purple stripe the Roman senators used to wear to mark officers because it was probably harder to get now than then." Derek laughed, shortly and sharply. Sarah thoguht that the strangest things became jokes after Judgment Day.

Wind blew in from the yard, fresh and warm, and sunlight made the dust motes shimmer and swirl around the room. There was a sandwich on the table, a plate to return and a war to fight and Derek Reese was here over-thinking underwear.

_Om Mani Padme Hum._

Sarah wanted to laugh but not as much as she wanted to cry. When he finally looked at her she almost did. Kyle had kind eyes- that much she remembered though the other details blurred more than she liked to admit. He had kind eyes. Worshipful eyes. When he looked at her she'd thought, even back then when she was soft and foolish and nineteen, she'd thought she just might be able to become everything he said she would become. Brave. Strong. The mother of the man who would save the world. Kyle's eyes made grand gestures. They doomed him to die because they had fallen in love with a photograph.

Derek's eyes were not like Kyle's. They were not often kind. And they'd rather look into a mirror and turn themselves to stone than watch her become the legend while the world slipped away. His eyes scanned every face for the threat buried beneath the smile and saw every weapon in a room before they even saw the people. His eyes looked at her in the half-light of the laundry room and saw her anger and her fear and her love for her son. Derek's eyes were for the details. And if they had doomed him, she feared it was because they had fallen in love with the woman.

His eyes held hers now and asked a question. She stared back and let him choose an answer. Her fist was still against his shoulder but his hands were at her waist. His fingers deftly unbuttoned her jeans and slid the zipper down with a rasp that made Sarah swallow hard. His eyes flicked down from her face for just an instant. "Black," he said.

"Most of it is," she replied. Derek nodded and stepped back. "Kacy made you a sandwich," Sarah said and knew she was breathing too loudly. "It's on the table."

He looked one more time at the bright bits of cotton on the laundry line, he left the room with the smallest of smiles on his lips.

The wind stirred the clothing, making the line jump.

_Om Mani Padme Hum._

End


End file.
